Siena’s rally snaps Quinnipiac’s win streak

Shannon injured for in loss; Iona clinches regular-season crown

HAMDEN >> An incredible month of February ended on a sour note for the Quinnipiac men’s basketball team. The Bobcats can only hope it doesn’t have ramifications that carry over into March.

Rob Poole’s three-point play with 35 seconds to play lifted Siena to a come-from-behind 72-70 win over the Bobcats in a Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference game at the TD Bank Sports Center Thursday night. The win ended Quinnipiac’s seven-game winning streak and squashed any hopes the Bobcats had of gaining a share of the conference’s regular-season title.

Brett Bisping paced Siena (14-16, 10-9 MAAC) with 16 points and 10 rebounds. Poole and Lavon Long both scored 13 points, and Ryan Oliver had 11 as the Saints overcame a 10-point first-half deficit to notch their third straight win.

Ike Azotam led Quinnipiac (19-9, 14-5) with 15 points and 10 rebounds while Ousmane Drame had a dozen points and 10 rebounds but played just 18 minutes do to foul problems. Zaid Hearst had 12 points including what looked to be a pivotal 3-pointer with 51 seconds left that gave the Bobcats a 69-66 lead.

But Siena scored six straight points keyed by Poole’s three-point play following a missed Saint free throw.

The Bobcats finished the month with a 7-1 mark, but its loss gave Iona the regular-season crown.

Quinnipiac may have also the services of star point guard Umar Shannon to a knee injury. Shannon was injured midway through the second first half in a collision that involved three Bobcat players. The transfer from St. Francis (Pa.) who had been crucial to Quinnipiac’s run to the top of the conference standings in its inaugural season was carried off the court and into the locker room and did not return.

“It doesn’t look good,” Quinnipiac coach Tom Moore said. “We don’t know much now, but it was his knee and it doesn’t look good. He did it on a drive.”

Poole’s game-turning basket capped a weird sequence. Long hit the first of two free throws to cut the deficit to 69-67. After the shot, the Quinnipiac bench instructed Azotam to switch sides of the basket to box out the bigger Saint for a potential rebound.

But Long’s miss went to the side that Azotam had been stationed on and Poole outleaped Hearst for the rebound. He immediately went to the basket, made a layup and was fouled to give Siena a 70-69 lead.

“That’s a simple box out that we normally do,” Moore said.

The Bobcats had a chance to regain the lead in the final seconds, but James Ford Jr. missed a 3-pointer with seven seconds left to play. Following two Siena free throws, Quinnipiac had the ball with a chance to tie, but Justin Harris couldn’t grab an inbounds pass for a potential game-tying 3-pointer. Harris was then fouled and made one of two shots to cap the scoring.

“We were outplayed tonight,” Moore said. “We weren’t sharp. All year long we’ve made big plays down the stretch in games but we didn’t do it tonight.

“We had chances but we didn’t make the plays on defense or on offense.”

Harris had a productive 11 points and five rebounds for the Bobcats while Evan Conti came off the bench to score 10 points. His pair of 3-pointers in the first half helped the Bobcats open up a 10-point lead, but the Saints closed the gap to 34-33 by halftime and took their first lead early in the second half.